


Through Locked Doors

by LittleBlueArtist



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Gen, Nah Just Kidding, anyway, gender discourse tm, have some shidge friendship thx, i like to hurt shiro bc he's my fave :), there's a lil
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-03
Updated: 2016-07-03
Packaged: 2018-07-19 19:44:36
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,167
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7374925
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LittleBlueArtist/pseuds/LittleBlueArtist
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Pidge and Shiro are kidnapped and taken prisoner by an intruding ship. Shiro swears he won't let Pidge become Matt, and Pidge won't let Shiro think the worst. Together they figure out an escape plan, and each other, while trying not to become the next experiment.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Through Locked Doors

**Author's Note:**

> LOL GUESS WHAT I WATCHED (for this fic and reasons i disclose within the writing, Pidge will be using he/him pronouns. thank you!)

When they wake up it’s in a glorified cage. There’s a sheet of glass preventing them from getting out, and inside is just a square of space. Shiro thinks he’s dreaming at first, this is just another nightmare of his days in the Galra prisons. The glass is different, so is the technology, but he can’t wrap his mind around the fact that this has happened  _ again _ . That he has to go through this hell one more time. What wakes him up is the sight of Pidge. His friend is curled in the corner, nothing on but a white t-shirt and underwear. Looking down, Shiro realizes he’s in the same thing. This is real. It’s happening again. He’s trapped in an alien prison. His heart starts pounding without his permission. Each breath is a knife sliding down his throat. He’s going to die here. He’s going to die in the same thing he killed to get out of. 

Pidge is there in a second, calming him down, rubbing soothing circles into his back. Pidge, a kid half his size, is the calm one here. “Shiro, it’s okay. I’ve been waiting for you to wake up. It doesn’t look like we’re in a Galra prison. They’re ship seems small, though this glass is Gemini Glass. It’s nearly impossible to break. We’ll get out, Shiro, I promise.” Pidge has been awake for hours, assessing each and every aspect of this prison, even timing the guards. Different ones come every ten minutes, and they aren’t drones. That makes it harder to break out.

All Shiro can think about is Matt. He won’t let the same thing happen to Pidge. He won’t let Pidge be altered by a place like this. There are hands roaming before he can stop them. They ride up the sleeve of his shirt. “Shiro? Shiro what’s this?” Pidge’s voice sounds breathy, like he can’t bring himself to go above a whisper. He can feel slim fingers slide delicately over his marred skin.

“It’s my arm, Pidge,” he says, yanking his shoulder away. The way Pidge recoils he almost regrets it, but telling him the truth is too much. He’s a monster. Shiro sighs and pushes his hair back, getting the tufts out of his face. He rubs the scar on his face, absently thinking and remembering how he got it. He can’t work out the timing because it’s not automated, and breaking through the glass isn’t an option unless they want every unit on them. They’ll have to wait for an opening. 

There’s a century of silence before either of them speaks. “You know me, Shiro. That scar isn’t surgical. Please don’t keep a secret from me. Not you.” Pidge’s voice trembles, like he’s scared the older boy will snap at him again. 

The captain sighs again and flexes his robotic fingers. He’s not human anymore. He’s not the gentle person he was a year ago. He has blood on his hands and a different glint in his eyes. The Shiro he is now would terrify the one who landed on Kerberos. He’s forgotten a lot of his imprisonment, but he remembers the feel of someone’s bare neck beneath his metal fingers. He remembers them pleading, scratching, trying to break free. He remembers that survival meant watching someone else die. 

The pain from getting the scar made it too hard to forget. “They dragged me away from your family into another room. I don’t remember what they did in there, but I woke up strapped to a surgical table. It didn’t hurt, but I was disgusted. They had taken part of me away and replaced it with them. I could reach a scalpel with my other hand and managed to break free.” He turned away from the smaller then, too ashamed to look him in the eye. He’s supposed to be the leader, a fearless warrior. How can he admit that he was so weak?

Taking a shaky breath, Shiro goes on, fists clenched. “I tried to cut it off. I had no anesthetic, but I stayed quiet. They found me covered in my own blood, arm half-severed. I almost died, but they stitched me back together. I was their toy.” They had done more experiments on him. He has cloudy memories of pokes and prods, but he can’t pull them to the surface. 

“Any higher up and you would have hit the axillary artery. You’re lucky you didn’t bleed out.”

The pilot laughed bitterly. “Lucky isn’t the word I would use for it, Pidge.” It was only a few days after that he was thrown into the ring, forced to fight. He learned pretty damn fast that no one in there had mercy. 

“Shiro there’s something that I--” Pidge cuts himself off. In front of them, passing through the cells, is another prisoner. She’s being dragged by her arms, long purple hair buzzed and torn in patches. There’s blood running down her face, but that doesn’t bother the two as much as what’s wrong with her legs. 

They’re gone.

However many she had have been cut off and the skin crudely sewn back together. Pidge subconsciously clutches Shiro, trying not to throw up. He wants to look away but he can’t, morbid curiosity forcing him to keep staring. She’s still bleeding from the wounds, and it leaves a trail of green behind her. His grip gets tighter, pressing into skin so hard it’ll bruise. Shiro doesn’t say a thing, just buries Pidge’s head in his chest, holds the shorter close. He’s seen it already, there’s no use in shielding him, but Shiro knows what comes next. She is failed. They don’t need her anymore.

He can feel Pidge’s small hands clutch his shirt. Shiro puts a hand on his head, absently running his fingers through brown hair as he looks. The incinerator is only a few feet down from their cell. The woman wakes up from the heat, her hair catching first. The place is soundproof, but he can see the way she’s screaming. Her eyes meet his, just for a second. They don’t ask for help, they don’t beg for a savior. Her round, red eyes are defeated. She’s saying goodbye, just so she has someone to say goodbye to. He gives her a nod, knowing there’s nothing else he can do. A quick memory of doing this in the Galra prison flashes through his mind, but it’s gone before he can remember completely. 

“Shiro, I’m scared.” His voice is barely above a whisper, ashamed of what he’s saying. He’s part of Voltron, the strongest weapon in the known universe, and he’s scared.

“We’re getting out of here. Both of us. I won’t leave you, Katie.” The name slips out, and despite coming out to the team, no one calls Pidge anything else. He’s too far in the past, thinking of days when Matt would talk about his family. 

Pidge’s face scrunches up at the name. He hasn’t been Katie for a long time. “Pidge. That’s my name now, Shiro.”

He feels like the worst human being for slipping, but Pidge is still curled into him, and his own hands are soothing his back. “I know. I’m sorry, Pidge. Your brother used to talk about you. We roomed together, and he used to talk about how smart you are. He always thought you would do something great. He was wrong. You’re doing  _ amazing _ things, Pidge. Your father and brother would be proud.”

Pidge knew Shiro was part distracting him and part distracting himself, but he played along. There were too many thoughts in his head not to. “I don’t know what I am anymore. It doesn’t feel right to call myself Katie, and it doesn’t feel right to be a girl anymore, even though I told everyone I was. I don’t know what I am, Shiro. I’m a freak.”

“We’re one billion light years away from Earth. I don’t think anyone minds that you’re not sure of your gender. We’re all here for you Pidge, and we’ll still be here when you figure things out.” 

Pidge hugs Shiro tightly one more time before finally lifting himself up. He’s scared, terrified of what’s captured them, but goddammit it’s time to be brave. He had done a sweep of the cell earlier, and there hadn’t been a protruding wires or technology he could use to their advantage. That meant they would have to wait for an opening. 

The room itself is nothing more than a hard floor and a toilet in the corner. There’s nothing to break out with, nothing to give them hope. Shiro stands, bringing Pidge up with him. He’s not letting go of the younger for a second. He made that mistake once, and he’s not letting it happen again. They’re getting out. 

“In a few hours they’ll take us for a physical of sorts. Everyone they’ve captured this week will be with us. That’s our opening. I know you’re not the best fighter, but we’ll have to do our best. Try to get hold of a weapon if you can. If you can’t, duck and run after me.” He doesn’t know how he knows this, because he can’t remember this part of his stay in the Galra prisons, but he just does.

“What about everyone else? We’re supposed to save the universe, not tuck tail and run when we’re in danger.”

Shiro  _ wants  _ to tuck tail and run. He doesn’t care about the prisoners on this ship. He wants to save them, but he  _ needs  _ Pidge to be okay. He needs Pidge to be able to walk off this ship and stay kind-hearted and happy-go-lucky. He can’t let someone else on his team turn out like him. He can’t let Pidge wake up in the middle of the night in a cold sweat wondering when the shaking will stop. 

“We can’t do much of anything alone and defenseless. We’ll have to come back for them. I’m sure the others are tracking us down right now. Once we can get to our lions we can save them.” He’s spouting nonsense to try and make things okay. That’s his job. He makes the plans, he’s the leader. He has to make sure his team doesn’t fall apart. 

Pidge sounds like he doesn’t believe him, but goes along anyway. They sit in a tense silence before two guards stand on the other side of the glass. He recognizes the weapon in their hands. It could fry them in an instant. He warns Pidge not to touch it before they’re handcuffed and hauled into a line. They’re, unsurprisingly, the only humans. The other beings look dull, already defeated, dirty and scared. Shiro looks away from all of the eyes assessing him, and uses his broad body to shield Pidge. Some of the beings in here consider human flesh a delicacy. 

They walk neatly into a clean room. They’ll only have their hands uncuffed for a minute to check for arm movement, and that’s when they’ll have to strike. Each second goes achingly slow until they’re uncuffed. Shiro focuses his energy in his arm, trying to remember how to use it. It can do some real damage if he can control it. Pidge focuses on the technology in the room. There’s some sort of control board near the entrance, and he might be able to find a way out of here if he can get to it. 

He narrowly misses getting stung by one of the stick-like weapons, trusting Shiro to deal with the fighting. It only takes a few seconds to hack into their system. For all the advanced engineering within the prison, the coding and firewalls aren’t that advanced. He’s memorizing the route to get out, vaguely listening to the fight before him. Other prisoners have gotten loose and they, too, are fighting for their freedom. Pidge finds the best route out, locks it into his memory, and then programs the ship to shut down. The lights go off all at once, only the emergency ones coming back on.

“Pidge, duck!” he hears Shiro call. He does so without thinking, almost getting hit by another prisoner. He has to remember that some of them are in here for a reason. 

“Shiro, let’s go! I’ve got the route!” Pidge reaches for his friend, locking onto the captain’s arm and dragging him out of the room. The beings that took them are starting to swarm the hallways. They have to move fast. They sprint through the hallways, going through the twists and turns of the ship easily, Pidge leading them to freedom. It’s almost comical the way they fail. They’re one left turn away from the main control room, where they can contact the rest of the team, when a knife is pressed to Pidge’s neck.

He can feel the blood run down his skin. It hurts, but fear overrides pain. “Shiro!” he screams, struggling to get away, trying to recall every fighting technique he’s ever learned. The knife presses harder, digging just a little deeper, and Pidge is scared. He’s terrified that after everything he’s been through, everyone he’s saved, that he’s going to die here. “Shiro, don’t leave me!”

The words stop Shiro in his tracks, causes him to take a blow to the face instead of blocking it. He can hear the same phrase coming from a different mouth, pleading with him not to go. Matt. He can remember it now. When Shiro had fought his way out, he was half crazed. Living every day taking someone else’s life just for sick enjoyment had corrupted him. He had to get out before he became the next Gladiator. He can hear Matt’s words echo around his head. He had left him, pressing against the glass of his cell, banging on it. He had left him behind. He wouldn’t let Pidge be subject to the same thing.

With more ferocity than he could ever remember having, Shiro fought. His arm seemed to think on its own, using every ounce of force to work with him, to defeat whatever the hell these aliens were. 

It isn’t long before he ends up in front of Pidge, breathing hard, body shaking slightly from exertion. He’s got memories from the ring in his mind, muscles taut, a glint in his eye that startles the shorter man. “Let. Him. Go.” His words come out as a growl.

“My detectors say English. Home planet: Earth. Spoken by approximately 399 million people. Interesting,” the alien says, all the while keeping Pidge in a deathly grip. He has four fingers on each hand, and three legs. His eyes, squinted and a dark color, have no emotion. He would kill both of them without a second thought, dissect their bodies just to know more. “You managed to take down my best. I’m quite impressed by you, human.”

“You’ll be dead if you don’t hand him over.” There’s a hardness in Shiro’s voice. He doesn’t remember the last time he used a tone like that, the memory shrouded.

“You humans bleed red. It’s very strange. I’d like to see how much you can withstand. This one here is smaller than you. Can they handle more pain than you? Does size matter?”

Shiro goes in head first, letting his body think for him. He’s hurt, he knows he can’t go much longer without extreme damage. Blood is soaking parts of his clothes, one leg has a bad burn from the weapons, and his body is nearing exertion levels. He has to get Pidge before he can no longer fight. But it ends up being Pidge that surprises everyone.

With Shiro as a distraction, the short boy elbows the alien where a soft spot should be, going deep into the muscle. The knife slips, cuts him deeper than he'd like, but he can keep going. He doesn’t have long before the pain subsides, so Pidge quickly punches him under the jaw, fracturing it and breaking up the joint. He grabs Shiro and runs, making the quick turn to the control room. There’s no one in it, thank the stars. He locks the doors behind them and quickly gets to work. His hands are shaking. There’s blood coming out from two of his knuckles and  _ holy crap he just hit someone _ . 

He’s trying so hard on something that should be so easy, but before he can slam the board in frustration, bigger hands are covering his. They stop the shaking, and a nice warmth settles on his back. “Pidge, breathe. Come on. In and out. It’s okay.” Shiro’s voice is calming, and it’s never been easier to suck in air. 

“Okay. I’m okay. I can do this.” His hands fly across the keys, pinpointing their exact location and sending it to Allura. There’s no way to set up a video feed to assure her they’re alright, but he sends a small message to let her know. “I sent the team our coordinates. They should be coming soon. We can just wait in here.” With any luck the door would hold, and they would be safe until the others came.

It’s Shiro, this time, that demands a hug. Pidge is the lifeline under his fingertips, the only thing that is holding him together. He can feel the rise and fall of Pidge’s chest, counts the seconds as they hold tight.

“I remember a little bit about breaking out,” the captain says, slowly sinking to his knees. His body is exhausted. “I… I was different. They kept saying that they made me strong, that I was better with this arm. The fact that I was their experiment kept me alive. I survived and I was healthy. Others… They weren’t so lucky. I remember being so instinctual, stripped down to my survival skills. I was everything they wanted me to be. I don’t remember how, but I remember getting an escape pod. That’s how I came back down. I’m sorry I couldn’t get Matt, Pidge. I’m sorry.”

Pidge curls up, brings his knees to his chest. “It’s okay.” It’s not okay, he knows it’s not. He wants to scream until his lungs give out, be angry at Shiro for leaving his family behind. He can’t change the past, can only hope for the future. 

The two stay in silence, listening for any noises outside. Pidge hears Allura first and he starts yelling, opening the door. It’s Lance and Keith who find them. Lance checks up on Pidge while Keith runs to Shiro, making sure he’s okay past the cuts and bruises. Hunk comes in a few minutes later, informing everyone the ship is waiting outside. Shiro can see the relief in his eyes, hear the extra breath in his words. He makes sure to give Hunk a hug when they pass.

Pidge and Shiro smile at each other, reminding themselves of what they managed to get through, and walk side by side onto the ship, back to where they will always belong.

**Author's Note:**

> Come hit me up about voltron on tumblr at [noyaplease](http://noyaplease.tumblr.com) ! I plan to write a lot more about this series because like Free! I connect with it immensely. So expect so more Voltron fics yo. Kudos and comments are appreciated! (Also sorry for all the mistakes it's 3am! I'll fix them when I get some time off work stuff!) Update: Did you like this fic? Want more of your own? Well I have good news! I've opened commissions! Find the info post [here!](http://noyaplease.tumblr.com/post/149722884338/writing-commissions)


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